The
Boy Scout

Robert Tait McKenzie was a
remarkable man - surgeon, physical educator, artist, and sculptor.
In addition, he was also a soldier, an athlete, a teacher, and
a writer. He was born in 1867 in Lanark County, Ontario, Canada,
the son of a minister of the Free Church of Scotland, who died
when Tait McKenzie was nine years
of age. McKenzie was the third
of four children in the family. He was graduated from McGill University,
and served on the McGill Medical School faculty from 1891 to 1904,
when he left McGill and joined the University of Pennsylvania
faculty as head of the new Department of Physical Education (1904-1931).
In addition to his responsibilities as head of the Physical Education
Department, he was a full professor on the medical faculty at
Pennsylvania as well as one of the men responsible for the success
of the Pennsylvania Relays, held each April. Also, Dr. McKenzie became famous as one of America's most brilliant sculptors through
his fine detail depicting the muscular coordination and build
of the human form.

As a professor, the development and growth of the youthful
mind delighted him. As a physician and scientist, he eagerly assisted
in the building of the young body from delicate babyhood to sturdy
adulthood. He maintained that fighting disease and making the
body develop physical fitness points the path to health. To all
this, we find he added the heart and soul of the arts, which delights
in the sheer grace and beauty of youth, while with his skill as
a sculptor, he was able to catch and hold for all time the fleeting
pose in the life of an active boy. It seems most appropriate that
the Boy Scout movement would appeal to such a man and equally
certain that the alert, self-reliant type of boy in the picturesque
Scout uniform would inspire the artistic mind with a desire to
snatch and mold into natural form that graceful pose of the strong
young figure. All this and much more is expressed in the statuette, The Boy Scout, modeled by Dr.
McKenzie.

The 1915 18-inch Statue

Dr. R. Tait McKenzie became
a member of the Philadelphia Council Executive Board in 1911 and
remained a member until January 1938. On March 10, 1911, at a
meeting of the Philadelphia Council, Dr.
McKenzie bestowed the original model of the statuette, an
18-inch bronze figure, and included the certificate of copyright
registration. The letter of presentation Dr.
McKenzie wrote is as follows:

To the Chairman, the Commissioner, and the Executive Council
of the Boy Scouts of America at their headquarters in Independence
Hall, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Honored Sirs: --

The undersigned, being in reasonably good health for one past
his first youth, and with a mind not more unsound than its habitual
state, doth hereby deed, donate, bestow, confer, and present
all right, privileges, responsibilities, and cares that have
hitherto been carried by the sculptor of the effigy of that cheerful
and kindly American youth known to his friends and to all well-wishers
of these United States as The Boy Scout, in order that
he may increase, be multiplied, and replenish the meeting places
of elect Troops scattered throughout this fair domain.

He trusts that his uncovered head may betoken them to reverence,
obedience to proper authority, the well-ordered discipline so
necessary to our well-being as a nation; that the hatchet, on
which his hand rests, may serve as a symbol of truthfulness that
characterized him who first sat in the chair of state in this
the birthplace of national freedom in America; that he may never
unsheathe it for grinding purposes; that he may never raise it
in the cause of wanton destruction, but always for the defense
of the weak and for hewing out new and nobler standards of conduct
and progress; that he may apply it unceasingly to the neck of
treachery, treason, cowardice, discourtesy, dishonesty and dirt.

In view of this, I herewith transfer, turnover, and give to
your keeping this Certificate of Copyright, being number 48,915
sent to me by Thorwald Solberg, Register of Copyrights of the
United States of America, to have and to hold, to use and to
defend, as may seem to your judgement wise and proper.

Ten people, each of whom contributed $100 defraying
the cost of making the mold and casting the same, received a bronze
replica of The Boy Scout. According to information in the
papers of Dr. Charles D. Hart, Council President (1912-1941),
no more of these bronze models were ever to be cast. Each copy
was numbered and the name of the person to whom it was given stamped
in the base. Among those receiving copies were Sir Robert Baden-Powell,
Connie Mack, George D. Porter and later Charles A Lindberg. Plaster
copies in the 18" size in green, bronze, and ivory finish
were made, starting in 1917, by Mazzoni and were distributed by
the National Council. Since the Philadelphia Council held the
copyright on them, it received a royalty on each statue sold.
It was discovered, however, that these plaster models did not
ship very well and the Philadelphia Council then arranged in 1934
with the National Council to have it make an 8" copy of the
original one, casting this newer and smaller model out of "white
metal." It was called "desk size" and finished
in bronze or silver by the Medallic Art Company. When these were
introduced, the Philadelphia Council, in agreement with the National
Council, discontinued the making or the marketing of any of the
18" plaster models. Philadelphia Council reserved the right,
however, to have a person named by Dr.
McKenzie check the model from time to time to see that copies
continued to come from the mold up to standard. In 1950, the 4"
model made its appearance and The Boy Scout became increasingly
popular. These smaller statuettes are finished in bronze, oxidized
copper and oxidized silver.

The 18" statuette has been permanently retired and never
copied since original 10 were made. George D. Porter, Philadelphia's
first Scout Commissioner (1912-1917) had one of the original statuettes
and was prevailed upon to give his copy to Marshall Foch, the
hero of Verdun, when he visited America after World War I. Marshall
Foch took his statuette back to France with him, but realizing
how Mr. Porter valued this work of art, returned it after about
two years. It stayed in the Porter family until 1948 when it was
sold to Dr. George Fisher, then National Scout Commissioner. The
statue was put on display in the Johnson Museum at the National
Council Office in New Brunswick, New Jersey. It was mounted on
a base of wood from Independence Hall.

The 1937 Life Size Statue

When the Philadelphia Council moved into its building on the
Parkway, it was expected that Dr.
McKenzie would provide a new statue, life size, for erection
in front of the building. This required a more detailed study
because it was on a larger scale. A few new insignia had been
introduced such as community strips and patrol medallions and
these were incorporated in the life size model.

Dr. McKenzie made the presentation
address at the unveiling of the life size statue in front of Philadelphia
Council headquarters, June 12, 1937, and related some of the early
developments of the statue. The following are excerpts from his
remarks:

"We are met here today, not so much to dedicate a statue,
in bronze, as a symbol of one of the greatest impulses for good
put into practical operation by a band of devoted men that has
ever come to American boyhood.

"Perhaps it would interest you to know how all this came
about? In 1914, the last year of peace which this distracted
world was to know for nearly two decades, Dr. Charles Hart suggested
that there should be something tangible which could be placed
before the eyes to represent the product of this altruistic organization,
something that would stand as a symbol for what Scouting stood
for, in fact a statuette of the "Ideal Boy Scout" and
in saying this, he pointed his finger at me. Knowing Dr. Hart
as I did, and with characteristic vigor that marks everything
he does, he arranged for a series of parades to enable me to
choose a suitable model. The competition narrowed to three; and
finally the one, Asa Franklin Williamson Hooven, was selected
as having the most points. The resulting statuette fixed for
all time, his fine face and boyish figure at 12 years of age,
although now at 35 he is approaching middle life."

Since the original Scout, Asa Franklin Williamson Hooven, and
an alternate, G. Dunbar Shewell, who posed for the statue had
long since grown to manhood, new boy models had to be obtained
so that a composite could be used. Dr.
McKenzie selected such boys. P. Douglas Shannon was used as
the model for the head. Scout Albert Frost was selected to model
for the high hiking shoes. Eventually the entire model was completed
using four boys as models including Joseph Straub. As the model
was being completed, the Scout Executive, Horace P. Kern, observed
that the axe handle was not quite in accord with the Scout axe
and Dr. McKenzie scraped off
some of the clay to adjust the shape of the handle. In doing so,
he finished with a ball of clay. He used it to create a deer's
hoof at the end of the axe handle, to copy a decoration on a Canadian
Guide's axe he had seen. When told that it was not official, he
called it artist's privilege.

It was Dr. McKenzie's desire
to make the statue available to any community that wished to buy
one providing that it was properly erected, suitably landscaped,
etc. A duplicate was made and shipped to Ottawa, Illinois, for
erection facing the grave of W. B. Boyce, the man whose interest
brought Scouting to America. Bedi Rasey, who did the casting,
shortly afterward engaged in war work. No more life size statues
were cast until 1954 when the Philadelphia Scouts and Scouters
presented a life sized statue to the National Council Headquarters,
at New Brunswick, New Jersey. This and succeeding statues have
been cast by the Modern Art Foundry, Long Island City, New York.
Joseph Brown of Princeton University and a student of McKenzie,
was the person designated to approve all life size statues before
shipping. A copy of the life size statue was unveiled in front
of the National Headquarters of the Boy Scouts of Canada in Ottawa,
Ontario, June 29, 1963. Scouts and Scouters of Philadelphia provided
funds for this gift as a token of friendship and good will.

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. [Article in Kutztown Patriot about International Fellowship of Scouting Rotarians Award.]